The present invention relates to a method for initially operating a portable data carrier, to a portable data carrier, and to a method for manufacturing such a data carrier.
For secure data transmission, use is frequently made of portable data carriers having non-volatile memories, e.g. USB tokens, flash memory elements or the like, which can be connected to an end device via a preferably standardized interface, in order that said device can read out useful data from the memory. This kind of data transmission is also employed by institutions and companies, e.g. by manufacturers or issuers of products involving telecommunications technology and/or information technology, such as e.g. electronic, possibly portable end devices or software, in order to make important useful data, such as e.g. updating data for products, firmware updates or software updates, access data or the like, available to users or customers directly or indirectly via a mandated data-carrier issuer.
In so doing, it is essential that a user can be sure of the intactness and integrity of the thus obtained useful data, e.g. by being able to ascertain without any doubt, if possible, that the data carrier has not been tampered with on its way, e.g. by mail, from the data-carrier issuer to the user, e.g. by being equipped with malicious code or tampered-with useful data. In this connection there exists the problem that a user can at first not verify for sure on the basis of the obtained data carrier whether it is still present in the unused and untampered-with delivery state or preoperational state intended by the data-carrier issuer. The user can thus not distinguish between an insecure data carrier that has already been initially operated and a secure data carrier not yet initially operated.
The “initial operation” of the data carrier is to be understood here as its first-time proper employment after manufacture and after the desired configuration in terms of data, with the term “initial operation” also including necessary and preparatory measures that enable its immediate first-time employment, such as e.g. the removal of an optical security seal or the like.
Besides the per se known employment of an optical security seal for proving a preoperational state of the data carrier, EP 1 183 895 B1 proposes that the initial operation of a data carrier requires a confirmation of initial operation by the user which is stored in the data carrier and can be checked via a contact-type interface of the data carrier. In contrast, EP 1 068 590 B1 proposes irreversibly activating an antenna interface of the data carrier by disconnecting a connection bridge upon initial operation.
It is therefore the object of the present invention to propose a portable data carrier wherein a user can check in a simple and secure manner whether an initial operation has already taken place.